But in a radio interview on Monday, Abbott was unwilling to commit to a conscience vote, saying any private member’s bill would be considered by the Liberal-National party room “in the normal way”. He pointed to the past failure of legislation to legalise same-sex marriage. “If there is a proposal put to the parliament, a private member’s bill put to the parliament, it will be dealt with by our party room in the normal way, and our policy has been that marriage is between a man and a woman but in the end it’s up to the party room to decide what our policy is,” Abbott told the ABC.

And Turnbull also got some pushback from an anti-gay Australian Senator.

Australian Senator Cory Bernardi has called on former Liberal leader and current Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull to stop publicly advocating equal marriage or resign from government… “If Malcolm Turnbull wants to talk about fringe issues outside party policy, he should resign from the frontbench,” Mr Bernardi said in response. “Our longstanding party position is that marriage is between a man and a woman. Our frontbenchers need to reflect that in any comments they make. When you are a frontbencher there is no room for a personal view.”

Two steps forward, one step back. Or is that one step forward, two steps back?